


Second Chances and Superhero Families

by normalisoverrated



Series: Second Chances and Families [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Dad!Coulson, Family, Natasha Romanov Feels, Parent Melinda May, Parent Natasha Romanov, Parent Phil Coulson, Skye | Daisy Johnson Feels, foundFamily, mom!May, mom!Natasha Romanov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-18
Updated: 2020-02-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:22:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22792441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/normalisoverrated/pseuds/normalisoverrated
Summary: Sequel to Second chances and fought for families.What would have changed in Age of Ultron if the Shield team had gotten involved? What would have changed if the inhuman team got involved? And what would the wider consequences of it have been?
Relationships: Clint Barton & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Melinda May & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Natasha Romanov & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Phil Coulson & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Phil Coulson/Melinda May, Skye | Daisy Johnson & Avengers Team
Series: Second Chances and Families [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1638475
Comments: 16
Kudos: 168





	Second Chances and Superhero Families

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, I know I finished the first fic in this series aaaaages ago and haven't posted anything since, but I've actually been working on a sequel!! It's already longer than I planned it to be, and got a while to go, but I thought I'd post this in the meantime! It's not proofread properly, because I've barely found time to write it and don't have any more time (probably should have been working instead of finishing writing this anyway tbh...). Hope there aren't too many mistakes! 
> 
> Hope you enjoy it, and please review, I love reading them :-)

Daisy was about to switch her phone off and stuff it in her bag when it started ringing, one of her mama’s aliases flashing up on the screen. She answered it instantly, keen to hear how her mama’s op had gone. She hadn’t heard from her since the Black Widow had called just before getting on a quinjet to deal with ‘Tony’s latest’.

“Hey mama” she said, holding the phone to her ear with her shoulder so she could finish suiting up.

“Pauchok” her mama said on the other end, voice rough and exhausted, and Daisy felt her heartbeat quicken. Something was wrong.

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

“I’m fine, I just, I”

“Liar” Daisy said, worry rising with every second and bleeding into her voice. Daisy didn’t think she’d _ever_ heard her mama sound so shaken, so broken up. 

“I’m not injured” Natasha replied. 

“What happened?” Daisy asked again, trying not to let it show how worried she was. 

“That Maximoff girl, the one you thought might be inhuman? She – she can do things - can mess with our heads. She did something, made me think, made me see, she....” Daisy hear her mama take a deep breath and her voice was steadier as she admitted “She sent me back to Hunan. I just, I needed to hear, I needed to know...”

“I’m ok mama. I was taken out of Hunan, I didn’t die. I’m fine.” Daisy said, not needing her mama to explain anymore. 

“I know” Nat said, voice shaky, “I just”

“I know” Daisy said. She was about to ask if her mama wanted her to ask Portal to send her to the farm, when Mack walked in, fully suited up and clearly wondering what was taking so long. Right, the op. Dammit. She’d forgotten that the Avengers weren’t the only ones with a crisis to deal with. For a moment she wished she wasn’t leader of a band of powered agents or that there was another team that could be sent in to deal with this situation. But there wasn’t, so she held up three fingers at her partner to indicate how long she’d be, and he nodded and disappeared again. 

“Mama? I’ve got to go.” Daisy said reluctantly “We’ve got 20 science-experiment-gone-wrong-giant-ants to deal with. Is Uncle Clint there?”

“Sounds fun.” her mama said, although Daisy could hear the usual edge of resignation to her voice. Daisy knew her mama would never be completely happy about her job, no matter how much she supported her decisions, or how proud Daisy knew her mama was of her. Daisy could relate. Hearing her mama sound so shaken reminded Daisy how little she liked the levels of danger her mama’s missions usually were. 

“Is Clint there?” Daisy asked again.

“Yeah, we’re at the farmhouse, Clint brought the team here.”

Daisy blinked at that, ran the words over in her head. Nope, still the same.  “The Avengers are at the farm?!?”

“Yeah, Coop and Lila think it’s brilliant” Nat said with dry amusement, and Daisy was relieved to hear her sound a bit better. She didn’t want to go, but this op needed the caterpillars, and she had a duty to her team. 

“OK, I’ll call when I finish the op ok? Give Laura, Clint and my cousins a hug from me?” _And have those hugs yourself_.

“I know what you’re doing, but I will. Be safe Quake.”

“I’ll do my best” Daisy promised. “I’ll call when we’re done.”

\------------

Daisy didn’t call when she was done. She texted. Nat got it just before she went to bed that night, curled on a roll-mat in Lila’s room so that Bruce could have her usual room. It read simply ‘Op finished. No injuries. V tired. Will call when I wake up.’. It wasn’t much, and it suggested Daisy had pushed her powers quite hard, but it was enough to tell her that her Pauchok was safe, and that was enough to let her sleep.

Nat never got the call. By the time her daughter had woken up she, Clint and Cap had gone to try to foil Ultron’s plan to make himself a new body and she’d been taken captive in the process. She’d left her phone behind, and Ultron blocked her comm, but she managed to get a message to Clint anyway, and she set about gathering as much information as she could while she waited for help or an opportunity. The former came first in the form of Bruce, and she barely let him get started suggesting leaving before she shoved him off a cliff, only feeling a little guilty. Bruce was a good friend, but Natasha was the Black Widow and an Avenger and she couldn’t put Bruce over the good the other guy could do.

And then everything was the chaos of an open battle field for a while. In a city that was _floating_ , which managed to reach a level of clusterfuck that only Budapest and New York had reached before. FUBAR didn’t even begin to describe the situation, and Nat was running out of bullets. Finally, she shot down the last robot in her immediate vicinity and there was a moment of quiet. The reason for the lack of new enemies became clear when she turned the corner and found Cap, accompanied by the female Maximoff twin. Nat felt a flicker of fear that she quickly squashed, followed by a surge of anger that she tucked away. The girl was clearly on their side, and she trusted Cap. That didn’t mean she had to like it. 

“Is that my jacket?” she asked instead, tucking her unease away to deal with later. 

“She’s with us” Cap said. 

“That still doesn’t explain the jacket.”

And then Clint was there too, his eyes running quickly over her, cataloguing the lack of serious injuries and the minor ones he could tell she was hiding. Nat gave her partner a quick smile, silently communicating that she was fine and she was sorry she’d worried him. And then they were discussing tactics with Cap, trying to work out what to do about the still rising city and the remaining civilians.

And then all four of them were spinning round, raising weapons towards the bubble opening in midair. Nat recognised it first, and lowered her guns, her shoulders clenching a little. She didn’t want Daisy anywhere _near_ this mess. Not with dozens of flying iron legion suits shooting bullets all around the city and the decreasing air quality. Not with the huge potential of all this to get even worse. But despite herself, she couldn’t help relaxing a little at the sight of her daughter, fully suited up, stepping out of the portal at the head of her team.

Her Pauchok’s eyes swept over her, her gaze not unlike Clint’s had been, albeit less experienced. The way her Pauchok’s face relaxed around the edges the moment she laid eyes on her said clearly as any words that Clint had told her when she’d been taken captive.

“Black Widow” Quake said, nodding to her, “Hawkeye, Captain America. We thought you might like a hand.”

“Quake” Cap said “You have _no idea_ how glad I am to see you.”

“Save the gratitude for later. We have a city to rescue.” Agent May said, with her usual bluntness. “Fury and Coulson are working on something, but for the moment, we’re on our own.”

“Understood” Cap said, just as her daughter spun round to face the blond haired girl that had just stepped through the portal. 

“Portal! Get back to base!”

The teenager shrank a little under the fury in her team-leader’s voice, but didn’t move to reopen the portal. “I’m staying to help.”

“No you aren’t! This is a battle-field Portal! It’s not safe. Get back to base!”

“No.” Portal repeated, raising her chin “I’m of age and I’m staying to help.”

“Only by two days. Sophie, go back to the Cocoon.” Nat glanced over at the man joining the argument, watching with interest as Arin glared at his sister, who didn’t even blink. 

“No, and you _literally_ can’t make me.” Kid had guts. Nat had to give her that. She was going to be in so much trouble later, but she certainly had guts. Which didn’t mean Nat wanted her on a battlefield. The kid was barely 18, and she knew Daisy had barely started her on serious combat. 

“We don’t have time for this.” May observed, her tight voice telling Nat that she didn’t like it anymore than any of the others did, but she knew they weren’t going to win. 

Her Pauchok sighed, “Fine! But the moment you feel your powers fading you go back to base, is that clear? And we’re having a long, long talk about orders when this is done.”

“Understood.” Portal said, an edge of trepidation in her voice. Good. She should be worried about the kind of insubordination she’d just shown. Nat would be worried about her Pauchok as a superior agent if she wasn’t. But Daisy was a good leader, and Nat could see it in the confidence with which she directed her team. 

“Right, Hound, Yo-Yo, you two are in charge of Portal, watch her back. You three are on search and rescue, portal anyone you find down to the ground, anyone injured send them straight to Simmons and Medic’s field-hospital. Volt, Smelt, take as many of these robots as you can get out of the sky. Cap, where do you want the rest of us?”

Nat felt her lips tug upwards in pride as she watched her daughter lead, confidence strong in her voice and stance. The five caterpillars she’d named headed off as soon as Quake turned her attention to Cap.

“Stark’s working on a solution for the vibranium core, but if a single Ultron suit escapes, then he can start again, and if he actives the core, the city goes down. We need to protect the core and take down the suits.” Cap summarised.

“You get the core then, we’ll deal with the suits.” May said, indicating the remaining caterpillars, herself, Hunter and Bobbi. 

“Agreed. Avengers, lets go.”

Nat nodded at the Captain and turned slightly to catch her daughter’s eyes, silently begging her to be careful. Daisy gave her a slightly irritated look that reminded her that her daughter could handle herself, and then a grudging nod. “You too” she mouthed back. Nat nodded back, and turned to head back into the fray. Only to do a double take and then stand staring for a couple of seconds.

In the brief time it had taken them to work out a battle plan, Volt and Smelt had been busy. Nat briefly remembered a teasing conversation in which they’d compared the Caterpillars and the Avengers, when Daisy had claimed either Volt or smelt could take out Iron Man easily. If the effect the pair were having on the Ultron suits was anything to go by, she wasn’t wrong.

The pair were sheltering between a wall and a van, hiding from the intense fire of at least thirty suits, but the reason for it was clear. Puddles of metals on the ground and nearby buildings testified to Smelt’s powers, while electricity was still crackling in little bolts around the metal shells of downed suits. Even as Nat watched Lincoln leaned out from behind the van to fire a stream of electricity at the nearest suit, leaping back swearing as a bullet grazed his arm.

“Mack, Puppet, help me cover them.” Quake ordered, vibrations streaming from her hands as she leaped up and forwards towards the crowd of suits. Nat made to run after her, heart jumping to her throat as her daughter headed straight for serious danger, but a hand on her arm arrested her movement. She almost flipped May (or tried to anyway, May wasn’t that easy to take down) before she recognised her.

“I’ve got her. Go do your job or we’re all doomed.”

Nat gritted her teeth, but reluctantly nodded. May was right. “Watch her six.” she snapped.

“Always.”

“Maximoff, with me.” Nat ordered, taking a moment to grab the Sokovian girl’s arm and snap her out of her staring. Wanda jumped, then scrambled to follow after her, and they ran to catch up with Clint and Steve. If they were lucky, they could deal with the main Ultron suit and the flying city while the Caterpillars and other Shield agents distracted the rest of the suits. 

“They, they have power. Like me. Like Pietro.” the girl running beside her gasped, her eyes half on following the other Avengers and half on Yo-Yo in the distance, vanishing and reappearing barely a split-second later with two children in her arms, who were unceremoniously shoved through a portal held open by Sophie, Hound watching protectively from beside her. 

“Save your questions for later. It’ll give you an incentive to survive.” Nat replied, surprised to find she meant it. The Maximoffs couldn’t be much older than Sophie, probably younger than her Pauchok. Early-twenties at the most if she had to guess. No matter how much Wanda had messed with her head, Nat didn’t want her dead. 

And then they’d reached the core, and Tony had an insane plan to deal with the flying city, and chaos reigned supreme again.

\--------------

Daisy was so proud of her caterpillars. They’d come so far in the brief months since the disastrous mission that had led to Benjy and Julie moving into the Cocoon. The inhumans were working as a team, calling intel and instructions through comms, watching each other’s backs. They had neither the experience of the Avengers, nor the instinctive knowledge of each other’s movements that senior agents had, but they trusted each other. Puppet and Mack provided constant cover for Lincoln as he aimed lightning bolts at Ultron suits, sending two or three of them spasming to the group each shot. Joey followed her without hesitation, directing his powers at the suits, turning them into piles of cooling metal as Daisy kept up a steady stream of vibrations to protect them from the bullets. They lost sight of Lincoln, Mack and Ben after a couple of minutes, but they kept in contact through the comms, calling out their status and progress. Hound chimed in every so often to inform them that sectors of the city were clear, and that Portal was keeping her energy (and by extension powers) up with rocket bars (Simmons had invented them, they were really extremely high calorie cereal bars, but the caterpillars tended to call them inhuman rocket fuel bars, rocket bars for short.). Daisy kept up a steady stream of acknowledgements and directions to her team, relieved when Yo-yo finally called through to say that all the buildings were clear, the only civilians left on the flying city had been gathered together in groups. Daisy told Portal to take Hound and Yo-yo to the ground, and get going with search and rescue there, and she hoped that her dad pulled through. Portal didn’t have nearly enough strength to get all the civilians safe. She was likely flagging as it was. She wasn’t even supposed to  _be here_ ! 

“Iron Man to little Widow, Iron Man to little Widow, do you read me?”

“Tony?” Daisy said incredulously “Did you just call me _little_ W _idow?_ Wait, did you hack our comms?”

“Awww, are you grumpy I hacked your programming? Is the mighty skyenet brought low?”

“If you’re only on comms to be an arse can you get off please?” Daisy said, rolling to avoid a piece of flying rubble and blasting a wave of vibrations at the last nearby Ultron suit.

“Ooh, language, bad girl, I’ll have to tell your mama.”

Daisy rolled her eyes, biting back several sarcastic comments “Stark, why are you on our comms?”

“Oh right, Fury and your dad pulled through, air-boats should be appearing soon, can your team start herding people on? We’re gonna draw the fight to the church.”

Daisy felt a wave of relief “Copy that.” a brief crackle in her comm indicated Tony getting off the line (which she was clearly going to need to encrypt better), and Daisy tapped it to open the link to the rest of the team. “Caterpillars? The director pulled through, split up and start getting people towards the edge, watch your backs. Portal, Hound, in ten minutes get back up here and check for stragglers.”

Affirmations echoed through the comm, and beside her Smelt nodded. She looked up to find that, whatever they were doing, the Avengers were being as good as their word – the scattered remnants of the Ultron suits were all heading towards the centre. Daisy didn’t waste any time, she headed for the nearest group of civilians and got to work. So much for being an under-the-radar team, incognito had just been shot to bits.

Barely five minutes later her comm crackled again “That was a short fight.” Tony’s voice complained.

“Well some of us have been doing our jobs!” Daisy teased

“Huh, children these days, no respect for their elders.”

Daisy’s lips twitched, unable to believe Tony had given her such a golden opportunity  “ Not my fault you’re ready to retire. ”  she teased

There was a pause, “I invited that didn’t I?”

“Yep.” she said, before moving onto more serious matters “Can you give us a hand with the civilians, there are a lot of them?”

“Already on it! Keep up little Widow.”

A crackle indicated his exit before Daisy could point out that her code-name was Quake  and that the actual Widow would half-kill him if he outed her as a Romanoff , and then she was too busy to care. The air was getting thinner making it even harder to get the crowd of civilians onto the flying vehicles, and exhaustion was starting to get to her. Two hard missions in a day and a half, with barely four hours sleep between them, was taking it’s toll. But finally the last of her bunch of civilians was loaded up, and Daisy scarfed down a rocket bar as she waved it off. It wasn’t as good as rest and sleep  and she didn’t have much power left , but it would give her a bit longer and it would have to do. She flung her vibrations at the ground and launched herself through the air, heading for the next boat along, where she could see people still making their way on. 

And then she saw three things all at once. She saw the boy crying behind a pile of rubble. She saw Hawkeye running towards him. And she saw the plane, spitting machine-gun fire heading _right for them_.

Fear and adrenaline surged through her body in a panicked wave as she threw everything she had into the vibrations, propelling herself through the air like a jet, flinging a hand in front of her just in time to send a wave of vibrations to hold off the bullets. She felt her power levels hit critical, then pass it, just as a blue flash out of the corner of her eye was accompanied by a searing pain through her shoulder.

Fuck. She’d missed one.

She hit the ground hard, and felt something in her ribs snap, before she could realise that she’d stopped vibrating the air keeping her up. A throbbing in her head indicated she’d hit her head in the fall too. Dimly, she heard Uncle Clint screaming her name, and it was coming from a strange distance away. Oh. The blue flash. The other Maximoff twin. He’d gotten them to safety. Idiot. He’d have been shot if Daisy hadn’t stopped the bullets.

Then strong arms were lifting her body, and Daisy struggled weakly. “Put me down. I’m fine.” She protested.

“You got shot! Shit, you got shot! Daisy, you’re shot!” 

“Are you panicking? I thought Avengers weren’t scared of anything.” Daisy teased. 

Uncle Clint didn’t respond, just took several harsh breaths and started jogging towards the boat. Daisy moaned, unable to hold it back as the pain in her shoulder got somehow worse. She’d forgotten just how much it hurt to get shot.

Her uncle put her down on the floor carefully, beside a blond haired man with a cocky, pained grin and a soaking red shirt, and Daisy realised with sudden horror that the bullet had gone through her fast enough to still do damage on second impact. Her vision was blurry, but she could tell he was bleeding fast. Too fast. Weakly, she raised a uninjured hand to her comm, groaning in pain as it jostled her ribs and other shoulder “Portal? I need you to send Medic to my location.”

There was a panicked slew of responses through the comm, and she groaned back “Negative. Hold your positions and do your jobs.” and then Jeni was there, her worried face bending over her.

“No, not me, him. He’s bleeding like Yo-Yo does.” Like a body built for super-speed did. Jeni visibly hesitated, then nodded and disappeared. Clint’s face reappeared in her vision, and his hand gently brushed strands of escapee hair out of her face. 

“It’s ok kid, it’s gonna be ok. Just take deep breaths for me, you’ll be ok.”

Daisy tried to focus on her uncles voice, but she knew the feeling of the intensified dizziness. “Don’t, don’t tell mama, not til I’m fine. She’d worry.” she slurred, and then the dizziness closed in, and it all went black.

\--------------

Daisy woke up to the aching muscles and pounding head that indicated she’d over-stretched her powers, something that Jeni unfortunately couldn’t heal away. The lack of extra pain in her ribs and shoulder though indicated that Medic had done what she could though. She blinked her eyes open carefully, finding herself in a vaguely familiar room that she was pretty sure was the medical bay in Avengers Tower. Yeah, that was the Stark Industries logo on the machines. She was in Avengers Tower. She wondered how long she’d been unconscious for. She took a longer look around the room and startled a little to find Wanda Maximoff sitting by her bed, eyes on the book on her lap but glazed in a way that Daisy knew meant she wasn’t really reading it.

Daisy wondered if it was possible to get out of bed and sneak out of the room without the girl noticing. She wasn’t sure she wanted to talk to her. The Maximoffs may have fought for them in the battle, but what Wanda had done to her mama... Before she could seriously consider it though, Wanda seemed to notice her gaze and looked up.

“You are awake.” she observed.

“Yeah, what are you doing here?” Daisy asked, trying not to let hostility creep into her tone. “Where are my, um, where is everyone?”

“Agent May and Director Coulson left to go to big meeting, Hawkeye and Black Widow got message on comm and had to go. I say I watch you.”

“I don’t need watching, and why would you do that?” Daisy said, irritated. 

Wanda bit her lip “You saved my brother’s life. Twice.”

Daisy resisted the urge to turn away from the intensity of the woman’s gaze and the depth of fear and gratefulness in it. She wouldn’t have wanted either even if she wasn’t angry with the woman.

“I barely did anything.” she said uncomfortably. 

“You block many bullets, you have him healed. The bullet almost hit his heart, I-I felt it. He would have died. You saved his life.”

Daisy opened her mouth to dismiss her, to say that it was her job, but instead what came out was “You messed with Black Widow’s mind.”

Wanda flinched, shoulders curling in slightly as her eyes dropped. “I’m sorry.”

Daisy gritted her teeth, anger rising further as she remembered the shakiness in her mama’s voice. The way her sentences had been short and broken. The way Daisy _knew_ her mama had been hurt worse than she’d shown. Sorry didn’t fix anything.

“You showed her her worse memories.” Daisy said, the note of accusation harsh in her voice. Wanda flinched again. Her fingers twisted together on her lap.

“I was angry, I make mistakes. I am trying to make it right.”

Abruptly, Daisy remembered Miles and lying to her team. She remembered afterlife, and her mom’s body flying through the air as she turned her powers against her family. She remembered running off on her own and almost dying because she didn’t want to face her parents. Wanda wasn’t the only one who had made stupid decisions in her life. And Daisy certainly wouldn’t be who she was today if she hadn’t been given so many second chances.

“Are you going to do it again?”

Wanda shook her head, and Daisy could see from her face that she meant it. She wriggled upright in bed and held out her hand “Lets start over then. I’m Daisy Mayson.”

Surprise, then hope flickered across Wanda’s face as she reached out to shake her hand. “I am Wanda Maximoff. You are not Daisy Romanoff?”

Daisy blinked “How did you...?”

“Black Widow panic when she see you hurt. It obvious then. Agent May and Coulson, you are important to them too?”

“They’re my adoptive parents,” Daisy said, pulling wires off her body, “it’s a long story.”

“You are lucky” Wanda said, a note of grief in her voice.

Daisy gave her a sympathetic grimace “Whatever happened to your parents, I’m sorry.”

Wanda shrugged, indicating she didn’t want to talk about it “I have Pietro. How do you have powers?”

The subject change was blatant, but Daisy allowed it “That’s a long story too. The short version is I have a very little bit of alien DNA, and when it was activated it gave me powers. My entire team are like me. We’re called inhumans.”

“Inhumans.” Wanda repeated “You have a team, for people like us?”

“Yeah, you could join us if you like?” Daisy offered. 

“Hey, no stealing our recruits!” complained a warm voice, and Daisy turned towards the door to see uncle Clint entering, holding a bag of food and a Starkpad. 

“Clint!” Daisy greeted with a grin, accepting the bag of food with relief, realising how hungry she was and digging in. It wasn’t an inhuman meal, but it was a large one, and it would do. 

“So what happened after I passed out?” she asked, swallowing her first mouthful.

“Clint grabbed a chair and brought it over to the bed, putting the Starkpad down for the moment. “Your Hound and Portal checked the city for stranglers, then the helicarrier flew away and Tony blew the city up. Search and rescue among the buildings damaged or levelled at the edges of what didn’t fly is still going, but as of an hour ago there were only fifteen casualties, largely thanks to your team. We made headlines in pretty much every country across the world. And uh, there’s a couple other things you are gonna need to know.”

Setting aside that last ominous comment, Daisy thought over what Clint had told them.  Casualties were never good, but to have so few from a situation that had been so bad was unbelievable. She highly doubted it was as much up to her caterpillars as the Avengers, who had actually dealt with Ultron and the flying-city-that-could-drop-and-destroy-the-earth bit, although Yo-Yo, Hound and Portal made an impressively effective team on search and rescue, and casualty figures were likely significantly to do with them. And, undoubtedly, to do with Medic. 

“How badly is my team’s anonymity broken?”

Clint picked up the Starkpad again “Not as badly as we initially thought it would be. There weren’t many camera’s in Sokovia to start with, and Ultron had done something to take the rest of them out, and for once there weren’t that many civilians filming instead of hiding. There are eyewitness accounts, and the press have been looking for information, but it was chaos, and there’s a lot of garbled and bad information out there. Pepper, Phil and Maria are working to garble it some more. Medic’s powers are well known now, there’s no avoiding that, and there are a lot of accounts of Yo-Yo and Portal, but no-one is quite sure what Hound was doing, and there are very few good accounts of what Puppet, Volt and Smelt were doing, and plenty of bad and inaccurate ones. 

Well that wasn’t great, but it was better than Daisy had been expecting. Wait. “What about my cover?”

Clint grimaced “Yours has been blown to bits. You got caught on camera from someone on the lifeboat with a phone when you saved me, Pietro and the kid. Which we’re going to talk about by the way, I’m an Avenger, it’s not your job to protect me.”

“I can stop bullets, you can’t.” Daisy pointed out, and then changed the subject before he could point out that she hadn’t stopped all the bullets. “What are the other things I need to know?”

Clint scowled, but allowed the subject change. “Yes, well, there’s this.” he said, and handed the Starkpad over. Daisy took one look and choked on her mouthful of food. She took another look once she was done coughing, not quite able to believe what she’d seen. But the headline still said in block capitals “NEW AVENGER QUAKE: HAWKEYE’S SECRET DAUGHTER?”

“They think I’m your daughter.” Daisy said finally, a little faintly. The headline was accompanied with a photo of a panicked Clint carrying her bleeding body to the lifeboat, and Daisy could see how they’d come to that conclusion, but still. How’d they get so close to the truth and miss so spectacularly? 

“There’s more” Clint said, reaching over to change tabs. The next page showed the Black Widow, back to the camera, kneeling beside Daisy’s unconscious body taking her pulse, one hand clenched into a fist. The caption read “IS THE BLACK WIDOW A STEPMOTHER?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me” Daisy moaned. 

“I’m afraid not, Nat’s furious.” 

Daisy thought of the edges of possessiveness her mama sometimes showed, and then the firmness with which she’d refused to let Daisy take Romanoff as a surname, and the care she took to protect her from the association, not to mention the fact that she and Clint weren’t in any way dating. Furious was probably the right word. 

“Where is mama?”

“She’s coming, she was still arguing with Pepper and Phil when I left, but they should all be down pretty soon.”

Daisy reflexively stretched out her powers, noting with a wince how weak they were, and felt footsteps coming up the stairs, one set hard and furious, one brisk and confident, and one calm and measured. 

“They’re coming. Mama’s still mad.” Daisy warned. 

“Hey! You’re not supposed to be using your powers!” Clint scolded. Daisy shrugged, noting that Wanda was gone and wondering when she’d left. 

There wasn’t much time to dwell on it though as the door was opening and her mama was coming in, followed by her dad and Pepper. Natasha’s face was stormy, although her expression relaxed into warmth when she saw Daisy was awake. Her dad looked tired, but offered her a genuine smile. 

“Good to see you up” he said, which Daisy took as permission to get out of bed fully and hug him. Her dad allowed it, but nudged her back onto the bed afterwards, and Daisy sat, her mama sinking onto the bed next to her and pulling her into a hug, the tightness of which indicated the worry she knew the black widow wouldn’t voice aloud. 

“Has Clint filled you in?” her dad asked indicating the Starkpad lying on the bed.

“He showed me a couple of articles yeah” Daisy said. Beside her, her mama scowled.

“Right, well, we think we need to get on top of this, and clear things up.”

Daisy raised her eyebrows, not sure she’d heard her dad correctly “You mean we’re gonna tell them the truth? But I thought...”

“You thought right” her mama said, frowning “I still don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Nat, we’ve been through this” Pepper said, “they have all three of you on camera, and you don’t look different enough to hide the truth if someone really looks, and someone will pretty soon. The truth is coming out, all we can do it control how it does so.”

“We’re making Daisy a target!” her mama argued, although the words had an edge of resigned acceptance to them. 

“Mama, I’ve been a Shield agent for years, I’m already a target. Plus, I’m Quake. And I can handle myself.”

Her mama’s shoulders slumped “I know Pauchok” she said. Daisy held back her sigh, hearing the unsaid words and grudgingly understanding them. She too wished her family weren’t routinely in so much danger.

“So what now? How are we doing this?”

“I’ve called a press conference for this evening.” Pepper said. “We’ll give a statement about Sokovia, and then call people up for questioning. I want you to go first, or at least before either Clint or Nat, and when questions about your parents are inevitably asked, tell as much of the truth as you and your parents agree to tell.”

“You want me to do a press conference?” Daisy asked, daunted. It was a good play, she could see that. It would draw attention away from her team at a crucial stage. It wouldn’t stop curious questions from being asked later, but it would buy time. Time for details to be forgotten, for memories to blur, and for them to decide how much to let the public know about the caterpillars. Daisy just wasn’t sure she wanted to walk out in front of a whole load of camera’s to do it. 

Her dad shot her a sympathetic look “You don’t have to, we’re not going to make you.”

“But it’s the best play” Daisy finished reluctantly. “I’ll do it.” 

\---------

And that was how Daisy, dressed in full Quake tactical gear, gloves and all, found herself walking out in front of a crowd of cameras. She focused on her breathing like her mom had told her, and tried not to think about how many people were probably watching the live broadcast. Pepper had started the press conference, and then Steve had given a statement, and then answered some questions, and now it was her turn. Her dad had had to go back to the helicarrier, helping Fury put it back where it had been stored, but her mom had given her a quick, tight hug and a few words of encouragement before she’d walked out of the side room.

Her mama, mom and dad had briefly discussed and decided on how much they were gonna say before her dad had had to leave, and Daisy tried to focus on that, and what she was supposed to be saying and not saying about Shield and the caterpillars if those questions came before she could redirect the conversation.

She reached the centre of the platform before she was ready, and nervously took the mike Pepper handed her.

“Hi, I’m Daisy Mayson, codename Quake.” she said, a little awkwardly. A wave of movement across the group of assembled reporters indicated many questions, and Daisy took a moment to be glad at how tightly Pepper controlled events like this.

“Umm, at the side, in the blue jumper” she picked at random.

“Are you a new Avenger?” was the question.

“No, this is actually the first time I’ve worked with the Avengers, I belong to a different team.”

The next question was unsurprising “Is that the team eyewitnesses have talked about that saved so many lives in Sokovia? Can you tell us more?”

“Yes, my team joined the Avengers in Sokovia, and we saved a lot of lives. We’re a pretty new team, but I think we did very well, especially in search and rescue. But it was the Avengers that really saved the day, they were the ones who stopped Sokovia from dropping and destroying the world. They have set an impressive example. We have a lot to live up to.” Undersell what the caterpillars had done. Redirect attention. Offer bait.

“You say you have a lot to live up to, is this to a parent? _Are you confirming that Hawkeye is your father?_ ”

Daisy swallowed, and took a deep breath. One sentence and there was no going back. She drew on the mission calm her mom had taught her “No, although you aren’t that far off. Hawkeye is actually my honorary uncle. Black Widow is my mother.”

There was a moment of stunned silence, and then a wave of hands rose, a wave of shocked whispering showing that the shock was enough to challenge even Pepper’s iron control over the press conference (and she’d established that control through a reputation of having reporters that shouted questions escorted out by security). Daisy picked a reporter at random again, receiving a slew of questions as the reporter tried to work out what he wanted to know more.

“Why have we never heard about you? What was it like growing up with an assassin and then Avenger for a mother? Did she raise you to be a superhero?”

“Uh” Daisy said, trying to buy time to sort out her thoughts “You haven’t heard about me for various reasons, not least that family life is private. I didn’t actually know she was my mama growing up, so no, I wasn’t raised to be a superhero. I became and agent on my own. She wouldn’t have anyway, she’s very supportive but I know she wouldn’t have chosen to let me spend my life, and I quote, “running towards bullets rather than away from them” if she could.”

The next question was also unsurprising “Why didn’t you grow know your mother growing up? Is that why your last name isn’t Romanoff?”

“It’s a long story, but the short version is that our safehouse was attacked, and everyone presumed dead. I actually survived, and was taken away from the attack, but mama didn’t know that, and believed I was also dead. And yes, I took the name of my adoptive parents.”

“You were adopted? How does that work out now that your mother is back in your life? How did that happen? What about your birth father?”

Daisy inwardly winced at the questions. This was edging close to questions about Hunan, which they’d agreed not to get into. It was too long, tangled, and painful a story to willingly share. She pressed her fingers against the button she’d slipped just inside her left gauntlet, signalling to Pepper to intervene soon.

“Yes I was adopted, and it works fine with mama back in my life, we’re an unusual family, but we’re still family. Mama and I met through work, that was how she realised I was alive. It was a bit of a shock to both of us, but a good one. My birth father is dead.” Daisy finished, reflexively pushing away the memory of her father’s hands on her face, draining her life, or her step-mother snapping his neck.

Hands kept waving, but Pepper had already stepped forwards to take the mic back “I’m afraid that is all we have time for from Quake.” she said, and continued speaking, but Daisy barely heard her, too busy controlling her walk at ‘brisk’ rather than ‘running out of here’. She closed the door to the side room behind her and collapsed into a seat with a moan.

“I hate public speaking” she moaned.

Her mom poked her in the ribs, “Stop being dramatic” she said, but it was accompanied by a warm smile, and her mom gave her another hug. “You did well.”

“At least I got to go first. I got the easy questions.” Daisy admitted “Not sure what mama and uncle Clint are gonna do.”

“Want to listen?” her mom offered.

“Sure” Daisy said, and her mom flipped a switch on the wall to switch off Tony’s crazy high-tech soundproofing.

“Nat’s a great mother!” Clint voice said, floating through the walls. “You should have seen her getting Daisy a kitten! She’s a big softie really!”

“Oh no” May groaned just as the sound of a thump came through the wall, accompanied by the grunt that indicated the Black Widow had just punched her partner infront of dozens of camera’s livestreaming out to the world. 

Daisy dropped her head into her hands and burst out laughing.  _Of course_ that was what her mama and uncle were going to do!

**Author's Note:**

> Wasn't sure where to end it, sorry if this is a bit abrupt. Hope you enjoyed it and please review :-)


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